Education in Canada

Suck it and see

Ontario tries school vouchers

GEORGE BUSH may have given up school vouchers, but across the northern border Ontario's premier, Mike Harris, is being much braver. After several false starts, he has brought in a plan far more radical than anything yet seen in the United States. It offers parents who send their child to a private school a refund in the form of a tax credit. This will rise over five years in steps of C$700 ($460) a year to C$3,500, or half the cost to the province of keeping a pupil in a public school.

Critics say that the scheme will undermine Ontario's public schools, which they see as the foundation of an integrated society. Toronto, a smorgasbord of races and religions, has a reputation for tolerance. Mr Harris's opponents claim that encouraging more private and religious schools (Ontario now has 730 private schools, half of them linked to a church, synagogue or mosque) will lead to social breakdown and ethnic segregation. They also complain that private schools do not have to follow the official Ontario curriculum, that their teachers are not officially licensed and that pupils do not sit provincial tests. Private elementary schools are not regulated by the education ministry.

But Mr Harris is a shrewd politician. He swept to power in 1995 by promising a 30% cut in provincial taxes, while eliminating Ontario's C$9 billion budget deficit. He achieved both, mainly by wielding the hatchet. In particular, he cut the money for public schools, forcing closures in both cities and rural areas. Teachers went on strike when he increased their workload. The elected boards that run the schools were deprived of local tax revenues, even as student numbers were rising.

Mr Harris then held back from further reform while he concentrated on winning a second term in an election two years ago. He is probably on safe political ground with his new scheme. Six other provinces in Canada provide money directly to private schools. Mr Harris's plan differs in that it will give the money directly to parents.

That idea has widespread support among all parents who despair of the public schools, and particularly those who want their children educated in their faith. The idea of the tax credit began with a complaint to the United Nations Human Rights Commission in Geneva by several Jewish and Christian groups. They argued that a constitutional provision whereby Catholic schools received provincial funds was discriminatory. In its ruling in 1999, the commission agreed.

Mr Harris at first argued that the financing of Catholic schools was a special case, guaranteed by the 1867 British North America Act that created the Canadian confederation. It was aimed particularly at reassuring Catholic Quebeckers. Janet Ecker, Mr Harris's education minister, said that extending public financing to other religious schools would cost $500m-700m a year. Since Ontario's tax-credit scheme covers only part of the costs of schooling, that figure is now about $300m.

On June 27th, despite passionate objections from Ontario's Liberal and New Democratic opposition, Mr Harris got his way with the passing of the budget bill, in which the school-voucher plan was buried. With that, he has taken another step either towards undermining Canada's welfare state, or towards increasing individual freedom and national competitiveness. Take your pick.